Page 51 of Thorns of Malice

This isn't the conversation I thought we'd have. I didn't expect him to go this route to play the game, but I should have anticipated it.

I thought he would try to run me out of town, but if he's going to willingly embrace me in this game, then that's fine.

Let him claim his love for me. I'll have to play my strategy differently. Either way, Dax Carrington's going down.

No matter what he, or any of the others, says, it'll never be true. They'll always see me as a hillbilly girl from West Virginia, one to be manipulated, used, and abused.

But the tide's turning. They're the ones who will get what's coming to them.

I'll die making sure of it.

10

Dax

Ivy has something up her sleeve, but I can't figure it out. I'm walking into a trap. I can feel it, yet I can't stop myself.

I'll do anything to get another shot with her. It's been too many years of pain without her, and now that she's back, it's glaring at me in the face.

So I have to get her back into my life. There's no way I'm not going to right the wrongs I did and let her go again.

All the years of wondering how she was and beating myself up about what I should have done differently come crashing together. It's now or never. This is the only chance I'll ever have to make her mine again, and I know it. And if she disappears again, it's over.

I'mover.

One touch from her and life sprung back inside me, reiterating what I've known all these years.

I've been dead without her.

It's on the tip of my tongue to tell her that I have money in a trust for her, that it's more than her father would've ever done with that patent.

If she wants to give it to him, she can. But it's hers to do with what she wants.

Yet I know Ivy's not only here because of the patent. This is about more than money. It has to do with everything that happened the night of the sorority rush and after.

More than anything, I want to believe that nothing happened between Avery and her, and that Ivy rejected my sister, but I can't get the video footage out of my mind. I haven't been able to for ten years.

If she didn't fuck Avery...

What if she did?

What if she didn't?

Can I forgive her if she did?

My gut tells me I've been a fool. Ivy never wanted Avery. If I had given her a chance to explain, things could have been saved between us.

My entire life would be different.

I pull up to the estate and the gates open.

Ivy takes a slow breath.

I glance over at her and put my hand on her thigh. "I assume it's hard for you to come back here."

She turns her head and smiles once again. It's a look Avery would give. But everything about that look on Ivy is intoxicating, drawing me more into her. She claims, "Not at all. I love this place. It's where I learned to become a little slut. Your dirty, pussy-dripping whore, right, Dax?"

"Don't say that," I order, and more regret hits me.

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